Democrats Hold Iowa Senate and Stymie Gay Marriage Repeal Effort

While Virginia showed itself yet again to be a state racing for the past - a past filed with bigotry and discrimination, one might add - in Iowa the Democrats retained control of the Iowa Senate and thereby stymied efforts by NOM and other anti-gay hate groups to shift control to the GOP which would have allowed efforts to amend the Iowa constitution to ban same sex marriage. NOM invested huge effort and money in the special election that pitted Democrat Liz Mathis (who received 56% of the vote) against GOP candidate Cindy Golding (who received only 44% of the vote). In the run up to the election an attack ad against Mathis similar to the one floated against Ralph Northam here in Virginia was disseminated. Naturally, with a wink and a nod NOM and the lunatics at The Family Leader disclaimed any knowledge of who was behind the ad. Here are highlights from the Des Moines Register:

Democratic candidate Liz Mathis won the $1 million special Iowa Senate race Tuesday, allowing her party to retain control of the chamber.

Democrats will maintain a 26-24 edge through the 2012 legislative session. Republicans had hoped for a 25-25 tie and the potential to move forward on now-gridlocked priorities, such as a move to begin the process to ban same-sex marriage in Iowa.

Nearly $1 million was raised for the race as of last Friday. Mathis raised $690,036 in cash and in-kind contributions, while Golding raised a total of $250,325, reports released Tuesday showed. And those numbers do not include third-party spending from groups that were not affiliated with a campaign but in some way advocated for a candidate.

The money is an indication of what was at stake, said Bob Vander Plaats, a former Iowa Republican candidate for governor and statewide crusader against same-sex marriage.

Vander Plaats’ group, the Family Leader, helped campaign for Golding. But the group viewed the larger goal as neutralizing the power of Senate Democratic Majority Leader Michael Gronstal. As majority leader, Gronstal has single-handedly blocked GOP priorities, such as the push for an amendment to the Iowa Constitution to ban same-sex marriage.

But the rhetoric turned ugly in the final days of the campaign when a group known as “Citizens for Honesty and Sound Marriage in Iowa” used robocalls to instruct voters to ask Mathis which gay sex acts she endorses.

Vander Plaats disavowed the ad, as did the Washington, D.C.-based National Organization for Marriage, a group that opposes same-sex marriage.

Contrary to what NOM would have the simple minded believe, same sex marriage only dominates the minds of religious extremists and professional Christians like Maggie Gallagher who is making a plush six figure income marketing anti-LGBT hatred.